Organised by the European Commission and the Centre for the Development of Industrial Technology in Spain, the 6th Aerodays 2011 took place in Madrid from 30th March to 1st April. The event provides a forum for Europe's aeronautics stakeholders to present and discuss their latest R&D.

In the Unmanned Aircraft Systems in Future Aviation stream, Nigel Mills (Technical Director Air Technology Insertion, QinetiQ) presented the paper "Opening the Airspace for UAS - ASTRAEA Progress Report".

In this talk, Nigel discussed the challenges of integrating UAS (Unmanned Aerial Systems) into civilian airspace. Over the last 100 years, regulations were developed with the implicit assumption that there is a human pilot onboard. There is currently no agreed regulatory framework for UAS to share airspace with piloted civilian aircraft. To read more, click on the Download PDF icon.